Part 2: Kamau Bobb, Google's Global Lead for Diversity Strategy

A Keynote from the 2020 To Code and Beyond event at NY's Cornell Tech.Kamau Bobb is a national authority in STEM education. He is the founding Senior Director of the Constellations Center for Equity in Computing at Georgia Tech. He is an engineer and science and technology policy scholar whose work focuses on the relationship between equity for students and communities of color in the STEM enterprise, large educational systems, and the social and structural conditions that influence contemporary American life.He brings to his current position a wealth of experience as a former Program Officer at the National Science Foundation (NSF). At NSF he was responsible for $30 million annually of investments targeted on improving computing and STEM education. In that role, Bobb worked at the highest levels of the federal government to help shape the national research agenda for effective means of delivering equitable and quality computational education to all students. He has worked with members of the Office and Science and Technology Policy in the Obama Administration to set the national strategy for STEM education at both post-secondary and secondary school levels. He was selected as a member of President Obama’s My Brother’s Keeper STEM + Entrepreneurship Taskforce to help U.S. cities craft strategies to engage young men and boys of color in the STEM landscape.Prior to his federal appointment, Bobb was the Director of the STEM Initiative for the University System of Georgia, a collaborative effort with the governor’s office to improve STEM education across the 30 public institutions serving approximately 325,000 students in the state. Bobb brings to STEM education a fierce commitment to equity as an indicator of justice. He has addressed and advised numerous leading tech sector companies, universities, and k-12 schools. His writing on STEM education and culture has been featured in The Atlantic, Black Enterprise, The Root, Edutopia and on the Obama White House Blog. His national and state leadership have contributed to a STEM education agenda that is more honest and reflective of contemporary social and cultural realities. Bobb holds a Ph.D. in Science and Technology Policy from Georgia Tech and M.S. and B.S. degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley. He lives in Atlanta with his wife, Lisa, and daughter, Sadira.Notes from the episode:Register for CS4All NYC's Men of Color Lunch: https://cs4all.force.com/s/lt-event?id=a2af4000001BKiuAAGCornell Tech's K-12 Initiative: https://tech.cornell.edu/impact/k-12/Kamau Bobb at SXSW Edu, 2019: https://youtu.be/ghnS4k3dCfgConstellations Center for Equity in Computing at Georgia Tech: http://constellations.gatech.edu/people/kamau-bobb Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Om Podcasten

The show is about learning with technology, the realities and exciting potential.Enjoying the show? Please take a moment to rate us, and leave a review wherever you've accessed the podcast. Find our listener survey at facebook.com/nosuchthingpodcast drop a like on the page while you're there.The music in this podcast was produced by Leroy Tindy, a guest in episode zero. You can find him on SoundCloud at AirTindi Beats.The podcast is produced by Marc Lesser. Marc is a specialist in the fields of digital learning and youth development with broad experience designing programming and learning environments in local and national contexts. Marc recently served as Youth Studies Practitioner Fellow at City University of New York, and leads a team of researchers and technologists for NAF (National Academy Foundation).Marc is the co-founder of Emoti-Con NYC, New York's biggest youth digital media and technology festival, and in 2012 was named a National School Boards Association “20-to-Watch” among national leaders in education and technology. Connect with Marc on BlueSky @malesser, or LinkedIn.What's with the ice cream truck in the logo? In the 80's, Richard E. Clark at University of Southern California set off a pretty epic debate based on his statement that "media are mere vehicles that deliver instruction but do not influence student achievement any more than the truck that delivers our groceries causes changes in nutrition." * So, the ice cream truck, it's a nod to Richard Clark, who frequently rings in my ear when I'm tempted to take things at face value. "Is it the method, or the medium?" I wonder.The title, No Such Thing, has a few meanings. Mostly, it emphasizes the importance of hard questions as we develop and document the narrative of "education" in the US. For Richard E. Clark, the question is whether there's such a thing as learning from new technologies. For others, it might be whether there's a panacea for the challenges we face in this field. Whatever your question, I hope that it reminds you to keep asking--yourself, your learners, others--what's working and how so.* Clark, R. E. (1983) Reconsidering Research on Learning From Media. Review of Educational Research 53(4) 445-459. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.